Stand Back and Shout
by OxymoronProne
Summary: Kylo Ren's mind connects with Rey's at random intervals, and this leads to an outcome nobody ever expected. /Background romance, not story central/
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: fuck everything. why am i like this?**

 **exists in the same universe as The Opportunist, though those events are just canon and you don't really need to read it prior to reading this one.**

 **like it or dont**

 **-oxy**

* * *

The air had left the room.

At least, that was what it felt like. The telltale sounds of the bridge of the _Millennium Falcon_ pinged and beeped their way into his ears and he grimaced, spinning to see Rey sitting in what he assumed to be the pilot's chair.

"And here I thought you'd shut me out," he accused, testing the water a little.

Rey did not answer, but her jaw clenched and her shoulders stiffened significantly. Evidently, she thought she'd done so as well. But she did not respond out loud.

"Oh, I must have forgotten you weren't alone," Kylo remarked, having not forgotten at all. Of course she wasn't alone; the entire remainder of the Resistance had fit onto the _Falcon_ upon escaping Crait.

She tensed even more, if that was possible. Her hands gripped a datapad so tight he could see her knuckles go white.

"If you're worried that I know anything about where you are or who is around you, be aware that I have no idea. I still only see you," Kylo said.

When Rey finally spoke, it was under her breath. " _Snoke is dead_ ," said Rey, and her words lead and followed themselves until they were sucked from the air.

"I know. I was the one who killed him, after all," Kylo replied. "And good riddance."

She threw a quick side glance at him, eyes hard and skeptical.

Kylo made an educated guess. "How are we still connected even though he's gone? I'm unsure. I've never come across anything like this in my studies. Though I'm imagining until we can work out a way to undo it, it will continue to happen at random."

Rey let out a barely noticeable sigh of frustration. She obviously thought she'd shut the door on the connection once and for all, and with nobody powerful enough to reopen it again, she'd considered herself safe.

" _Rey_?" Her head whipped to the side, presumably to locate the speaker.

"One of your friends, I assume?" Kylo muttered.

" _Stay out of my head_ ," Rey whispered harshly at him, and turned completely away.

All of a sudden, Kylo was alone, and the officers on the bridge of the _Finalizer_ stared at him and then put their heads back down to continue working when he narrowed his eyes at them.

He sharply departed the command center and made his way to his quarters, scoffing lightly to himself.

Stay out of her head? He would if he could.


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: i mean im pretty shit at writing stuff in the now**

 **it usually gets written in this convoluted fashion where i tell you about what's already happened instead of what's happening now**

 **i'll try to get better at it**

 **this fucking idea won't leave me alone i'm so offended by it**

 **how dare this idea do this to me**

 **-oxy**

* * *

Kylo was right. Their minds continued connecting at random. Sometimes it was weeks in between their meetings, sometimes it was hours.

And of course, Rey gave nothing away regarding the movements of the Resistance, something she must have been tutored in by Leia Organa. Rey was never alone, never able to respond with the fierce voice of the girl from the throne room.

"Keeping busy, are we?" Kylo would ask, and, "I don't suppose you'd like to reveal any sensitive information so I can track down your friends and end your Resistance once and for all," which merely gained him huffs and rolled eyes.

The little deadpan looks and sighs and grimaces told him he was getting to her. He made no effort to block the connections, as inconvenient as they were to his command as Supreme Leader.

Conversations would pull him from his duties in the middle of meetings, and he would appear to talk to the empty air. His subordinates did not receive explanations. Many of them assumed that he was going insane. He lifted them off the ground with his mind and threw them against walls until all of them assumed, rightly, that his one-ended conversations were with another person through the Force.

The interactions between Kylo and Rey went on for months, generally ending abruptly with Rey being called away for some sort of business the Resistance needed her for.

Every time the world would go silent save for the sounds of wherever Rey was, a jolt of excitement blasted through his veins. He wondered what she would be doing when he caught her this time. There was a certain level of bubbly anticipation that came along with the meetings, no matter how unhappy Rey was to see him. Maybe it was because his own surroundings were always black and white and gray, and she was always a burst of sudden color.

So when his own surroundings became deadened to him and he heard low, indistinct passing conversations and Rey's soft breathing, a small smile quirked his lips before he knew what was happening, and he whirled around to see what she was doing this time.

Meditating, apparently.

Legs crossed, eyes closed, hands resting gently on her knees, Rey was meditating on a small square mat. She wore her hair differently, he noticed.

"I remember that piece of the training," Kylo admitted as a greeting, "I could never quite manage to completely clear my mind. Can you?"

Rey sat and meditated.

Kylo felt rising indignation as she ignored him.

"So interesting that the Jedi encourage you to purge all intense emotion and attachment so you can sit on the floor and let your legs fall asleep," said Kylo, trying to get a rise out of the girl on the floor. It didn't work. She sat.

He tried again. "My uncle was the one to teach me how to meditate. I never got into it. Then again, look how well meditation worked out for him."

Nothing.

" _React_! _Emote_! Do _something_!" Kylo shouted in anger.

Rey sat peacefully, breathing in and out slowly.

Rey had tried to ignore his speaking to her on many occasions, but when he managed to poke at her with the remarks he made, she would either snap back at him with words ("My offer still stands, even though you nearly killed us both by exploding a lightsaber" gained him a muttered and angry " _I'm wanted in every system in the galaxy because of you_ ") or dismiss his remarks with her actions ("Still learning, I see. I can practically feel your strength in the Force from here" gained him an exasperated sigh and a grumpy look).

This was more than just ignoring him; she didn't even flinch. It was almost as if -

It was almost as if she couldn't hear him _at all_.

So she'd been working on a method to block him out. Searched and tested and revised and found one that worked. Why?

Maybe she'd been worried about revealing information. Maybe she'd just been annoyed.

Maybe she just hated him, no matter how much he wished that weren't the case.

 _-that happens when you're being hunted by a creature in a mask-_

Kylo's hands clenched tightly into fists.

The Force connection faltered and failed, the image of Rey vanished, and Kylo was alone again in his bedroom.

He destroyed two walls and a door.


	3. Chapter 3

After several of their meetings where he only shouted his throat raw, he'd tried blocking their Force connection out also. He just didn't feel like watching Rey perform menial tasks or meditate or sleep. He didn't feel like being ignored.

He sat in his quarters on the floor, trying meditation once more, and removed himself from the Force completely. The sudden loss of freedom choked him, and sent him sprawling backwards onto his back, gasping for air. He coughed and clawed for breath alone in his room, and eventually managed to reign in the sensation of suffocation.

He remained without the Force for a week before it drove him completely mad, and he reopened the connection to the power that had caused all of his problems in the first place.

It was evident to him that even his last resort wouldn't work.

So he shouted abuse at Rey. He reached out and tried to strike her. He spoke at length about nothing until his throat was hoarse. Once or twice he tried shooting her with a blaster as she'd once done to him. At the sound of the blaster firing, phantom pain jolted through his side where he'd once been hit with a bowcaster.

Shouting broke into sobbing, more often than not.

There were too many of his subordinates doubting him, now, for him to handle. He saw and felt the doubt and fear for himself when they witnessed one of his 'episodes.'

The ranks of the First Order began to shrink.

* * *

The corridors felt quiet. There were many Stormtroopers and officers missing from the registers. Those that remained stayed paralyzed in parade rest when he passed them by, the fear rolling off them in waves and poisoning the air.

"Where is Hux?" He snarled at someone who definitely didn't want to talk to him.

"The General hasn't been seen in two days, Sir," the terrified young man replied, snapping to attention.

Kylo's eyes felt hot.

 _Snap-hiss_ went his lightsaber, and the wall of the corridor felt his wrath as the young man practically sprinted away.

There were many of his interactions that ended this way.

* * *

A year went by, and the passage of time crashed into Kylo Ren one day when he found himself alone on a planet he'd only ever heard of in Ben Solo's mother's stories.

The world was falling apart.

He did not know how to stop it.

* * *

"I realized I'd never explained it to you in a way that would make sense. Maybe you'll hear me again one day, and I can do so properly."

Kylo sat on the ground, leaning against a wall.

"When I made my offer," he explained to the woman who couldn't hear him or perceive him in any meaningful way, "I didn't want you to join me on the dark side. I told you, I wanted all of it to end. Let the light and the dark die. We could have made something in between. Something different. That's what I meant. I'm sorry if it didn't seem that way at the time."

Rey continued eating something that looked less than appetizing to Kylo. She was eating and laughing with people Kylo couldn't see. She seemed happy.

And why shouldn't she be?

The First Order was a thing of the past. There had been too many deserters and not enough remaining officers to deal with them. The operation itself had crumbled from the inside, and Supreme Leader Kylo Ren was a joke.

 _-you're nothing but a child in a mask-_

Kylo wasn't a leader. He couldn't enforce his rules, couldn't manage so many troops and strategies and logistics at once. They thought he was insane. They had a right to. Hux had been the first one to jump ship, and morale had quite apparently taken a sharp dip.

Nobody listened to the disgraced, half-crazed Kylo Ren anymore. He was all by himself.

The loneliness was a yawning, gaping, starving maw in his chest that refused to be quelled or quieted in any way.

"There isn't a day that goes by that I don't wish you'd just taken my hand," Kylo admitted lowly.

And then he was alone again.

He leaned his head back against the twisted, ruined metal and contemplated his lightsaber.


	4. Chapter 4

Rey no longer found her mind connected to the mind of Kylo Ren, and that was probably for the best. It interrupted important duties, it caused problems when he made her snap back at him.

But in quiet moments, she would feel overwhelming sadness that did not belong to her. There was so much pain and guilt and shame, and sometimes she could swear she heard Kylo speaking to her still.

When the First Order began to falter and fail, she wondered what had happened to the man who'd had such resolve, such anger. But she and Finn especially had an important job to do, and she couldn't dwell on these ponderings for very long at all.

Rey sat calmly and quietly along with Finn on one side of a large wooden desk. She tried to exude as much gentle support as she could for the sake of their newest guest.

"I know this is scary," Finn began, "but I promise you, we can help. We can find you a place to call your own and get you set up anywhere you want."

The nervous, shaking woman on the other side of the desk bit her lip and fidgeted with the loose, plain brown clothing she wore. She'd been one of the ones that wanted to burn their 'Trooper clothing, then.

Rey pushed some serenity towards her, and her muscles visibly relaxed.

"There's nothing that you can tell us that we will be surprised by. We've truly seen and heard it all. All we're here to do is help you, I hope you understand that," Rey said softly to the blonde woman.

Some of them wanted to talk, some of them didn't. Rey imagined the ones that did felt like they just couldn't keep the deeds in their heads anymore. The ones that didn't want to talk, Rey figured they would find some other way to deal with it. She knew that feeling of pride. Asking for help was always hard.

Finn sometimes spoke with Rey at length about what he'd witnessed as a Stormtrooper. Rey sometimes felt horrific pain from him when he talked about it with Poe. Those two spent nights together sometimes, and they both seemed happier for it.

This woman did not want to speak about it - she remained silent.

Finn pushed through. "How about we start with a name? Would you like to change yours?"

The woman's blonde head bobbed up and down in a semblance of a nod.

"Wonderful! I can read you a list of names, you can look through a database of names, or if there's been one in your mind for a while that you like, that can be your new one?" Finn asked.

"'Karis,'" the woman replied, and her voice was very soft and afraid, "I'd like to be called 'Karis.'"

Rey smiled softly at the woman who became more brave and confident with every passing moment speaking with her and Finn.

Soon, all the arrangements were made and Karis left with a folder full of paperwork to find the officers who would be responsible for relocating her and providing her with a fresh start.

Rey felt such respect for Finn, who had thrown himself into aiding his fellow defecting Stormtroopers with the gusto of someone who'd been working for the Resistance for much longer than he had. Republic, now. No longer the Resistance.

When there came a soft knock at the door, Rey and Finn glanced at each other once and steeled themselves. There was no telling who would walk through that door or what they would bring them to work through, but they would do everything they could to help.

* * *

Rey sat with Finn, Poe, and Rose at a table in the mess hall, eating whatever protein slop had been prepared for the evening meal.

"Think your day was intense? The new guy in the repair bay doesn't know the difference between a spanner and a buffing hammer," Rose complained good-naturedly. Rose _always_ knew what to say to bring the mood back up.

A laugh left Rey's lips before she knew what was happening.

Her right hand tingled a little.

She felt that far away sadness again.

* * *

It had taken him months, but Kylo had finally found some peon who knew how to get a message to General Organa.

Said peon didn't seem to be very afraid of the mighty Kylo Ren, until he came face to face with the infamous red lightsaber. Then he was suddenly scrambling to do whatever Kylo asked.

Kylo was known to him to be unhinged. Insane. Do what he wanted, or die painfully in an unnatural way.

"Send my words exactly," Kylo demanded, "if you want to keep your head."

"Of course," jittered the technician, "begin dictation whenever you're ready."

Kylo took a deep breath. "'I went to an event on Bespin last week. It's lovely. Have you ever been?'"

A moment, and then, "Sir, is this correct?"

Kylo scanned over it carefully. "Yes. And add these coordinates to the end of the communication."

"Right away."

He stepped back from the console and let the now worthless man leave without another word or glance. Now, to return to his place in the ruins and wait for something to happen.


	5. Chapter 5

General Organa threw open the door to Rey's room early in the morning, startling the young Jedi awake. Rey was instantly alert and worried when she saw how hard the General was breathing, and the tears running down her sallow cheeks. There was only one subject that would get the General so worked up, and Rey's heart was instantly in her throat.

"General - what's happened?" She stood from her cot and held Leia's hands gently, trying her best to calm her friend.

"A communication! He-he's-" Leia stuttered out, and for a horrible, lengthy moment while the General gathered herself, Rey feared that Kylo Ren was dead. In her next breath, Leia managed, "He's surrendered!"

Rey gently took Leia by the shoulders, "Are you absolutely sure?"

"It was a message that could only have been him - he used the code word I taught him. He added coordinates at the end - we've got to go get him." Leia explained.

Rey desperately wanted to believe her. She wanted so badly for the intel she'd received to be true. Wanted very, very much for the sudden relief she felt to be about something genuine.

"General, please don't misunderstand me, I would be very happy if you're right and Kylo Ren has given up, but if I'm being honest I don't know how good the odds are that the man who's led a one-person crusade against the Republic for the past six months-"

"Rey, I'm sure. I can feel it," Leia was serious.

Rey remembered how Snoke had been able to 'see into' Kylo's heart to accomplish nearly the same thing, and how he'd been cut in half with a lightsaber. She instantly formed a plan.

"General, if you're sure, then I believe you. But please let me go instead; if something goes wrong, you're far too important to lose," Rey proposed.

Rey feared for the General's life, no matter how authentic and genuine Leia had claimed the message was.

General Organa, no matter how excited she was about the idea of having her son home, reluctantly agreed that she needed to remain onsite.

Rey spent a day deciding who it would be that accompanied her, and ended up deciding on herself, Chewbacca, Finn, and Poe.

She packed for every eventuality, and picked up the bowstaff-turned-lightsaber she'd constructed with a heavy heart. She desperately hoped that the meeting would not require her to use it.

A final glance around her room with her bag slung over her shoulder and her staff clenched in her hand told her she'd not forgotten anything. She walked through the hallways towards the hangar, where Chewie was waiting for her with the boys and the _Falcon_.

To her embarrassment, people in the hallways still nodded reverently at her or stood at slight attention when she passed them. She was learning to be more proud of her near-mastery of the Force, but it was still difficult to feel at ease accepting actions like that from people around her.

The boys and the General were waiting for her when she arrived in the hangar bay, and the General's wavering expression gave her pause.

Rey was embraced quickly by the older woman, who shook slightly when she made a quiet request.

"If you honestly believe he can come home, bring him back to me. If not…" General Organa trailed off, choking on the words she would've said.

Rey felt the sadness and fear punch her in the chest. She gave a serene expression and tried to push some calm towards the General, even though she didn't feel quite so calm herself. The words the General didn't say felt like seeping poison dripping down Rey's scalp.

"If not," Rey said, "then I have my orders."

The General nodded, and Rey was walking up the ramp with her team to retrieve the General's son.

She sat with Chewie in the cockpit, and the Wookie seemed quietly determined. Ben Solo was practically his nephew, and had been so important in Han's life and his own life. He'd helped raise the kid. And still Chewie was conflicted - this was the boy who'd murdered Han Solo, Chewie's best friend.

Chewie growled softly as they made the jump the lightspeed, and Rey barely caught it.

"I know," she replied, "I hope so, too."

She left him in the cockpit alone while she went to speak with her friends in the small living area.

Poe and Finn sat together on the circular couch. Poe's mouth was set in a hard line, though his arm was slung over Finn's shoulder. Finn was practically trembling, nerves tainting the air.

"I know this will be difficult for you both," Rey began slowly, "as it is difficult for me. I've asked you two to come on this mission with me not because I believe you'll be unbiased in your actions, but because I trust you with my life. You don't need to interact with him at any point if all goes well. If it goes badly, I would appreciate your help neutralizing the threat," Rey was proud that her voice didn't tremble once.

Poe glanced at Rey with earnest brown eyes.

"Rey, if we didn't think we could handle this, we wouldn'tve agreed to come," Poe said.

Finn nodded, short and brave, and Rey smiled. Her friend, at great personal cost to himself, was willing to face down one of the demons from his past for her.

Poe hugged Finn a little tighter to himself.

"We'll be right behind you the whole way, Rey."

* * *

They found him where he said he'd be according to the message.

Kylo Ren sat in a ruined stone building on the planet Naboo.

Rey and her small team approached tentatively, hands on holstered weapons. Poe, Chewie, Finn, and Rey all advanced after a brief glance at each other to ensure they were all on the same page. Rey led the band of Republic officers.

Kylo looked older, more tired. There were bags under his eyes. His dark hair was wild, his clothing was dirtied and torn. The scar running down the right side of his face was faint but visible. Rey felt the same anguish she'd felt off and on for months - for a whole year - and her eyebrows pulled together in sympathy.

"This was the planet my grandmother was born on," Kylo mentioned loudly from his spot against a crumbling stone wall. He had his eyes closed. His lightsaber was on the ground by his right hand, but he made no move toward it. "Padme Amidala. She was Queen of Naboo for a while. Luke Skywalker was a lot like her, you know. My mother is a lot more like my grandfather than she is like Padme."

Rey glanced back at her friends, who nodded at her to press forward. "Kylo Ren. Myself and my companions have come here to accept the surrender you offered to General Leia Organa on her behalf."

"I spent so long trying to be the man I thought my grandfather was," Kylo continued, as if Rey hadn't spoken at all, "I couldn't see that he was so different to this picture I'd made of him in my mind. When I finally did see, it was too late. I was Kylo Ren, the murderer. Kylo Ren, weapon of the First Order. And then when I killed Snoke I was still a murderer, and I was the leader of the First Order. And then it all fell apart, and now I'm a murderer and a leader of nothing.

"It's so hard to be angry all the time. But you can never truly purge negative emotions - that would be inhuman. I wondered why there was nothing in the middle," Kylo frowned.

"Kylo Ren, if I am to understand the General's interpretation of your message, you offered your surrender. If she was incorrect, you should be aware that I will have to act accordingly," Rey ground out. The sadness crossing the distance between her and Ren was weighing her down.

"My mother told me stories of her and her friends' battles against the Empire. My favorite one was about Bespin. My uncle was in trouble, and my mother sensed his presence and rescued him. He would've died or been captured by the Empire and been at the mercy of Palpatine and Vader," Kylo continued. "When she sent me to train with Luke, she told me that if I ever needed to come home for any reason, I just needed to send her a message with the word 'Bespin' in it. I never used it until a couple days ago."

The tired man opened his eyes, which were bright with tears.

"If...if you all will let me, and my mother will let me, I would like to come home, please," Kylo said. He looked directly over at Rey and scanned her company briefly. Slowly, he stood and scooped up his lightsaber. The unlit weapon fell heavy to the ground at Rey's feet, and Kylo held up his hands, showing they were empty.

"I surrender."

* * *

"What do you want me to call you?"

"'Ben' is fine."

"Ben...I am sorry, you know."

"You don't have anything to be sorry for. You gave me every opportunity. If anything, I should be grovelling for forgiveness."

"Your father and I...we didn't do enough to help you."

"I can't talk about this right now. I might never be able to. It feels like the guilt might crush me."

"I understand."

"No, you don't. You never will. But that's okay."

* * *

"I suppose I still don't understand."

"I don't, either."

"Please don't take it the wrong way - I am happy that you're here now, and you're not necessarily lost anymore - but I don't know what changed to cause it."

Ben closed his eyes and breathed slowly and and out through his nose. He wanted to vomit.

"You couldn't hear me anymore," he began simply, "So whenever I spoke to you, all I could hear was myself. For over a year, I would just hear me in those moments. It drove me insane. And I just got more and more angry and sad. And I was missing - something. Something felt wrong."

Rey stared at him, brows pulled together, frowning. She said nothing.

"I talked at you for a year, and I figured out that I was missing more than I thought. I needed to come home," Ben said.

"What will you do now that you're here?"

"I know that nothing I ever do will make up for the pain that I've caused, so I can't stop trying until I'm dead."

Ben was looking down at the scars on his hands and arms when Rey tugged him very gently into a hug.

"Welcome home, Ben."


	6. Epilogue

**A/N: Little tiny epilogue for nobody's favorite riff. Love you all, bye**

 **-oxy**

* * *

The base was quiet early in the morning.

It was often quiet on the base, but especially this early.

There were no flustered technicians running around, yelling about intel. There were no dropped datachips or klaxon alarms or proximity warning sirens. No pilots clad in orange made the sprint for their crafts. No astromechs wheeled about on orders to launch for the defensive.

Ben walked very slowly down the hallway, his fingertips skirting lightly against the walls he passed. Everything was spotless and shiny - he could see his reflection in the sheen of the floor. He didn't look down.

The Republic didn't have much use for a military base of this size. Currently, there was nobody to fight. If anything, the base was useful as a staging site to help place First Order defectors. There were still hundreds of thousands of those to work through.

This was a good place to let Kylo Ren die, and Ben Solo to appear after years of absence. That was Ben's mother's plan, anyway. She pulled every rank she had to make sure her son wasn't executed.

The official record stated that Kylo Ren died in an attempt to escape capture while hiding on the planet Naboo, and that Ben Solo had been his hostage for many years. The small kernel of truth in that proclamation, Leia felt, made up for the other inaccuracies.

Ben didn't know how he felt about his mother keeping the galactic attention off him in such a way that he didn't have to truly answer for what he'd done. Maybe the guilt swallowing him whole would begin to make amends.

He felt someone very familiar approaching him from behind, and stiffened. No ill intent poured out, but he couldn't trust his evaluation of the situation anymore.

"So you fancy an early morning walk?" Rey asked casually.

Ben turned to meet her eyes slowly. She was unarmed, dressed in loose pants and a shirt with no sleeves. Her feet were bare.

"Am I allowed?" Ben asked cautiously.

"You're not a prisoner, so I don't see why you wouldn't be," Rey said.

"Well, maybe I should be," Ben muttered, and pressed his palm against the sleek wall.

Rey stared at him with the eyes of the girl from Naboo. "You know, I can feel your emotions from here."

"I wasn't trying to hide them."

"You're in so much _pain_ , Ben," Rey pressed.

"Yes, I am."

There was a pause, and the corridor went quiet for a moment.

"Come meditate with me?" Rey asked, and held out her hand.

 _-join me. please-_

He reached out and placed his hand in hers.


End file.
